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Which rugby players suffer most with injuries?

According to a three year study of injuries affecting players in the top 14 rugby clubs in France between 2012 and 2015, the front row (2 props and one hooker) account for 26% of the total injuries with the hooker being the worst affected. The player wearing the No 2 shirt suffers more blood, face, neck and knee injuries than any other position, and is second in the list of concussion and shoulder injuries.

After the hooker, the props take their fair share of beatings with the loosehead (No 1 shirt) incurring more shoulder injuries than any other position and the tight-heads (No. 3 shirt) ranking highest in the ankle injury charts. Interestingly, while the loosehead props were second only to the hooker in suffering neck and shoulder injuries, the tightheads suffered less in those categories but more with lower leg injuries.

In fact, the front-row and half-backs made up 43% of all injury substitutions. Fly-halves suffer more concussions than any other position and scrum-halves suffering more shoulder and knee injuries (with the exception of the front-row).

On a positive note, the incidence of concussion didn’t change in the three seasons, with between 36 and 38 concussions per season, an average of two cases each weekend. In addition the number of blood injuries dropped by 22%, and face injuries fell by 27%.

However elbow injuries increased dramatically (133%) and hand injuries soared by 250% over the three seasons.

When are rugby injuries most likely to happen?

According to the research nearly half of all injuries were sustained in tackles (46.6 per cent) and the player being tackled accounted for nearly a third of them. Contrary to popular belief, the scrum only accounted for 2.4 per cent of injuries.

More injuries occur during matches (57%) than in training, and more often in the second half of the game.